If you’re interested in teaching your child how to ride a bike, then I thought you’d be interested in hearing about how I taught my son to ride a REAL bike, WITHOUT training wheels, by the time he was 28 months old.
I bought him a Strider Bike! Below is my Strider Bike Review!
What is a Strider Bike? It’s a bike that was designed around the theory that a child could learn to ride a bike faster if he first learned how to balance the bike, BEFORE he learned to pedal.
Here’s how it works:
The inventors of the strider bike have removed the pedals from their bikes so that your child can simply straddle the bike with his hands on the handle bars and then simply walk with the bike between his legs.
When I got my son a Strider Bike for his second birthday he spent the first day just walking around with it and getting the feel for how to move the handle bars to keep the bike from falling over.
On the second day he started experimenting with sitting down on the bike, and taking small steps. And in my opinion this is where the magic happens, because this is when the child starts to tip over… and instead of just letting themselves tip over because they know a “training wheel” is going to keep them from falling over… they put down their foot to break their fall.
This teaches kids the limitations of what they can and can’t do with their bodies on the bike, and they VERY quickly learn how to not tip over while sitting on the balance bike and walking very slowly.
This only took a few days for my son to figure out, and from all the other parents I tell to get this bike, their children catch on just as quickly.
Once the child figures out the balance, they start pushing their own limits, and the progress REALLY starts to accelerate.
They’ll accidentally come to a slope in the driveway that catches them off guard and gives them a short experience of what it’s like to coast, or they’ll get going to fast, turn the steering wheel to hard and have to put a foot down to keep from falling.
These little failures and success are helping the child figure out what the real limitations are in a way that starts slowly, so if they fall, they don’t fall to hard.
After one week my son was taking big strides on his own and picking up his feet to balance going straight, and a few weeks after that he was picking up his feet and turning.
And as I write this it is now 5 months after he first got on the bike and he has just ridden a REAL bike, with pedals for the first time. We had to spend about 1 week using a bike with training wheels to teach him to pedal, and with me running beside him as he learned how to get the bike started and how to break, but after just one week I can now officially say that he learned to ride a REAL bike before he was 2 1/2!
My neighbors are absolutely blown away, and people think he’s gifted with super human coordination, but I know differently.
I know that it was all because of a simple concept that REALLY teaches kids how to ride a bike the right way, by teaching balance first.
If you’re interested in teaching your kid to ride a bike, this is where I bought my Strider Bike from
If you are serious about teaching your child to ride a bike as early as possible, and opening up his world to the fun of riding, and increasing his physical coordination, I highly encourage you to order one today.
Your child will LOVE you for it!
I too have been using a strider balance bike to teach my son to ride. He absolutely loves the bike and he is able to move the bike around without my assistance, which is great for me. I am sure he will master it soon. I Love Strider Bikes.
We fell in love with the design and benefits of the Strider PREbike, and are now a family owned dealer/distributor in Orange County, California. There is no comparison to other heavy bikes with training wheels, or awkward tricycles. A truly MUST-SEE. Visit our store and see them in action at http://www.OCpreBIKES.com ** We guarantee you will not find a lower advertised price anywhere! ** Free assembly or shipping, local pick-up is ok! 855-PRE-BIKE
We’ve had many opportunities to look at the Strider closely and every time, we find something that just doesn’t agree with our philosophy.
Biggest selling point for the Strider? Price. It’s an easy $99 impulse purchase. The problem with the $99 price is that- I hate to say it- it’s really a $49 bike. Parents think they are getting a deal and what they’re really getting is ripped off. No offense. Nothing personal. It’s just business. Take a look at the “WeeRIDE” balance bike now selling for $29 and try to tell me that the Strider is exactly 341% better quality or value. It’s not going to happen. Check Amazon ratings..
Today another opportunity to inspect a brand new Strider, in the showroom of a prominent bike dealer. I picked it up and spun the 10″ wheel, close to my ear. It sounded like a meat grinder, with no meat in it. The EVA foam tires have a tread pattern with no discerning pattern really, just a weird collection of bumps and indentations.
Here’s the worst of it. I put the bike down on the cement floor of the shop. With one hand on the handlebars and one hand on the seat, I tipped the bike toward me and pushed against the two tires. The bike slipped away from me on it’s tires as though the floor was buttered with axle grease. Shocked, I grapped the nearest kid’s bike with real rubber pneumatic tires and did the same test. Unsurprisingly, it would not budge and gripped the floor like glue. All I can say is I really hope that parents don’t let their toddlers try this bike inside of the store, because they are going to go home bandaged and bruised.
Long story short, we are not impressed with the Strider. The cheap tires are just too big of a negative to overcome any of it’s positive.. which is a shame because people and their kids deserve better. Yeah it’s conveniently available in bike shops where crit-dad and tri-mom are easily convinced to blow the equivalent of a tubular road tire on a whole bike for their kid. Unfortunately, buying decisions made for 2 year old toddlers should give some consideration to safety, at any cost.
Strider played it’s cards right and became in instant success by doing one thing right- they plugged their product into big distribution, gaining access to thousands of Independent Bike Dealer showrooms. How hard can it be to succeed when there aren’t any opponents? The only thing that this success proves is that it pays to be the first in line.. but at some point your turn will be over and someone else will take your place.
Parents, if your price point is $99, if safety and quality are important to you, buy a KaZAM Balance Bike.